No group loves disparaging the psychobabble of group-victimization more than your average Republican pols – and oh, my, are they ever average in so many ways. But let any cloud descend on them, expose any of their malfeasances, attack their party in any way, and presto! -- tear glands swell, voices choke and par excellence cries of victimization flood the airwaves.
The party's decades-long lecture to those of us made of weaker stuff on the girlie-man pitfalls of VictimSpeak have, of course, mostly glistened as an advertisement of its manly ruggedness – more of a political talking point to be hustled to its base of culturally discontented whites than a genuinely thoughtful caveat about the harmful consequences of avoiding personal or group responsibility. In short, the message has always been grounded in emotive, argumentum-ad-populum racist appeal.
Fair enough, one could say, in that politics is, after all, a quintessentially popular sport. For just as long Democratic pols have played the same game in reverse, assuring their various groups-as-base that social constructions, and only social constructions, account for their every sad situation. As the sport of hogwashed generalizations goes, both parties are varsity players.
What separates and distinguishes Republicans, however, is their unequaled artistry in that other strain of American political tradition – hypocrisy. Again, Democrats have always flipped and flopped as any political party is wont, even obliged at times, to do, but in this category one cannot say they have flipped and flopped with the best of them, because no one – absolutely no one – has ever played the game as well as modern Republicans. They are the Babes, the Lou Gehrigs, the Hank Aarons of hypocrisy, and their record-holding feats aren't likely ever to be outdone.
As you probably expected, this background is intended only as a lead-up to the increasingly amusing Foley Affair. I say amusing, because a stomach-turning incident that could have been dispatched with ethically ruthless efficiency has rapidly devolved into a supreme tragicomedy at the hands of those self-proclaimed victimized hypocrites – Republican Congressmen.
"We're taking responsibility," announced the House "supervisor," Dennis Hastert, yesterday, just after clarifying that "I haven't done anything wrong." Go figure.
But what made things so uproarious were Mr. Hastert's VictimSpeak comments, wrapped in the high art of Hypocrisy, to the Chicago Tribune: "The people who want to see this thing blow up are ABC News and a lot of Democratic operatives, people funded by George Soros. I saw Bill Clinton's adviser Richard Morris was saying these guys knew about this all along." (Hastert, quite innocently I'm sure, omitted that Dick Morris now hates Bill Clinton as much as he loves Sean Hannity.)
Stunning is the only word for it. Victimization is a real-life phenomenon to be reckoned with after all. Dennis is a victim, his party colleagues are victims, they take full responsibility for doing positively nothing wrong. The sinister liberal media are out to get them, opposition operatives who were just as surprised (and naturally pleased) as anyone are possessed of conspiratorial evil, and somehow, oddly, very oddly, the specter of George Soros looms over the whole sordid affair.
Mr. Hastert, he of usually moderate temperament, has indeed partaken of the flip-flip, flop-flop GOP Kool-Aid. It was only a matter of time. No man can surround himself with the party's professional mixers year after year without some of that professionalism rubbing off.
So what is to be done?
Just enjoy.